The varied chemotherapeusis of pneumococcic meningitis has been replaced by treatment with a single chemical, sulfapyridine, with beneficial results. Typing of the causative pneumococcus makes it possible to employ a specific pneumococcus serum, when that is available, instead of the polyvalent serums in wide use during the period of multiple chemotherapy. Specific serum administered early in conjunction with sulfapyridine, together with prompt and adequate surgical removal of the primary focus, has resulted in an increase in the number of recoveries. This will be still greater as knowledge and skill in serotherapy and chemotherapy advance.
While meningitis in the presence of an aural infection is most often secondary to the otitic lesion, it may possibly be due to paranasal sinusitis, especially sphenoiditis, or it may be transported by the blood from an infection in the respiratory tract or may even be a primary involvement of the meninges and not dependent on